


a vignette

by havisham



Category: JAMES M. R. - Works, Literary RPF, The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Backstory, M/M, Spiders, Weirdness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-23
Updated: 2020-08-23
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:20:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26065624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/havisham/pseuds/havisham
Summary: Atrueghost story is hard to find.
Relationships: Jonah Magnus/M.R. James
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14





	a vignette

Dickie Mendelson had always been a light-hearted chap, not one for erudition or any sort of antiquarian pursuits. Of course, that had been before the war and one must allow the war to change everyone, even an undergraduate at Kings. Mendelson was a handsome man, fresh-faced and fair, with sharp, cutting eyes to stop one from romanticising him too much. Now, that was strange. Before the war, I remember that his eyes had been brown but they were clearly grey now. My doddering old age -- I am nearly fifty-one -- must be showing itself in that, of course I had no especial reason to remember the color of Mendelson’s eyes. 

Mendelson came in with the rest to hear the ghost stories written for Christmas. He was quiet and appreciative -- for the most part. He wasn’t one to shout out saucy comments during the reading, but afterwards he stopped me and asked, in the most intimate terms, if the story was true. 

“True!” I exclaimed. “Why, my good man …” One would expect that time at both Eton and Kings would have enabled poor Dickie to pick out fact from fiction, but he forestalled my doubt. 

“I meant, sir, if you had ever experienced a real ghost story,” he said and his eyes gleamed with what I thought was unwholesome interest. “For I have one, I think, and I would like to tell it to you.” 

Now, as you may no doubt guess, since my habit of writing ghost stories has become more well known, I have sometimes had people offer me their ghost stories, almost as a point of gossip. To the man, none of these stories have ever led to much. If ghosts are indeed real, they are strange and fragmentary and encounters with them have no narrative thrust. I was about to decline Mendelson’s offer and send him off when he reached out and plucked a spider and her thread, which apparently had been hovering just above my ear. 

It was an unpleasant sight, as I have a particular horror of spiders and creeping things. 

“Perhaps it is not the time now,” he said, almost to himself. But in the end, I did not see Mendelson again. He left Kings without taking a degree and I believe he is employed at the Magnus Institute now. It is rather a pity to lose him, as he was good company. But the reason I speak of him now is -- that he has written to say that the archives at the Institute were in a terrible state. He would like me to come and catalogue it. I am considering it, though I doubt any could be medieval apocrypha, which is ostensibly my speciality. 

But for oddities from the last century or so, one can look no further than the Magnus Institute. In his letter, Mendelson said that he still looked forward to hearing my one true ghost story and sharing his own. 

I think I shall have to decline Mendelson. His story, when he shares it, will perhaps be more real than I have need for. And as for my story -- I do not particularly wish to share it with him. Something in me forbids it and I must obey this advice, as vague and ill-form though the impulse is.

**Author's Note:**

> \- Listen, I had to go back three directors of the Magnus Institute -- from Elias Bouchard, James Wright to Richard Mendelson to find the appropriate person to creep on old Monty. Anyway, so anyone named Richard has to have a nickname (it's the law) and any Dickie, of course, looks like [Dickie Greenleaf](https://mentalfloss.atavist.com/the-bizarre-true-story-behind-the-talented-mr-ripley). Thank you. 
> 
> \- If James had accepted the invitation, he would have gotten THE SCARE OF HIS LIFE, which would certainly involve SPIDERS and also WOMEN ENTERING HIS HALLOWED ALL-MALE INSTITUTIONS. so basically the backstory of "The Ash Tree".
> 
> \- It would not involve cats, which he loved!!!


End file.
